The right kind of crackdown in Pakistan?

The Asian Age reports that Pakistan’s President Pervez Musharraf has given the go-ahead for a massive crackdown in the restive tribal areas for the purpose of crushing pro-Taliban and Al Qaeda militants. To the extent that Musharaf is serious, this doesn’t seem like the time for the U.S. to counteract his attempts to consolidate power.
Via Reliapundit, who also links to this report that Musharraf is redeploying his forces from the border with India to the border with Afghanistan, and this report suggesting that the state of emergency will be lifted in two to three weeks.
JOHN adds: I hope very much that those reports are correct, although it’s not obvious why Musharraf needed to suspend the constitution to crack down on al Qaeda. As usual, though, it’s hard to tell what’s going on by reading press accounts, which have focused mainly on Musharraf’s crackdown on lawyers. For many–not us–that may be almost as welcome as a campaign against al Qaeda, but we hope he has something more productive in mind.
To comment on this post, go here.